


Homes

by morrezela



Series: The Fairy Tale 'Verse [7]
Category: Supernatural RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, Alternate Universe - Royalty, M/M, Magic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-24
Updated: 2013-03-24
Packaged: 2017-12-06 07:11:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,281
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/732860
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/morrezela/pseuds/morrezela
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fairytale AU: Living in a changed world is harder than dying for it.</p>
<p>This is the seventh installment of the Sorcerer-Carpenter verse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Homes

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings: YET MORE SADNESS!
> 
> Reading Staircases, Portraits, Journeys, Hopes, Betrayals and Rescues first is advisable for the full impact of the story.
> 
> A/N: Hah! I warned you this would be sad as well. *hides*
> 
> All mistakes you find are my own.

The numbness was not expected. Nothing was expected. Or he had expected nothing. Jensen did not know anymore; he could not remember. He knew that he had believed himself to be the sacrifice in the final battle to set his world back on its correct path. Memories would flash through his mind that would remind him of his determination to offer himself up for the good of his people and his country.

But those ideas, those imaginings were cast aside with the knowledge that Jared was gone. Every remembrance of his absence in the world made Jensen’s mind halt in its tracks. Thinking was impossible. There was only action. He was a breathing puppet, and his woodenness was felt by those around him.

Jensen did not ride beside the cart that brought Jared’s body back to his parent’s village. He insisted on driving it himself, making a spectacle of the one and only prince of the kingdom. The act was as much one of cowardice as it was honor. No person would dare cheer a funeral procession. If Jensen were separate from it, he would no doubt be hailed a victor or saluted as the heir to the throne that he once again was.

But he was safe in the driver’s seat of a hearse. The black horses under the reins were far too grand for the wooden wagon that Jared rested upon. Morgan’s carriage horses were not meant to pull so unwieldy a vehicle, but Jensen hadn’t wished to delay his journey while they searched for a better transport for Jared’s coffin.

The coffin itself was the best that could be found in the village where Jared had passed his last breath. It would not have been fitting to have the king’s most honorable carpenter laid to his rest in anything but the finest casket, especially not when the carpenter’s family dealt in the trade of fabrics. It was expensive, but Jensen had for once ignored practicality and used his royal name to excess. The royal coffers could afford to pay whatever exorbitant price he ended up being charged.

From what his guards told him, the kingdom itself was celebrating. It was Jensen and Jared’s family who mourned. There were pockets of sadness, certainly. Their battle had undone the curse, but it had not removed it as though it had never been. The people could still remember loved ones who had simply never come into being, and they grieved. But those same people could feel the rightness of the world as it now was. Curses brought evil with them, and the one that Jared’s sacrifice had lifted was one of the most powerful brought into existence.

Cities plagued with illness and drought were back to being healthy and vibrant. The mines began to show veins of gold and silver where there was nothing but cheap rock before. The wild game in the forests surged to life. Even beyond the good economic fortune of the kingdom, there was a sense of rightness that had been missing for far too long. There would be those who would hold a grudge against Jensen because of what had been taken from them, but they would not be many in number.

If those people were to try to rally against him, his bodyguards were there to protect him. He had not been a day into his journey to return Jared’s body to Jared’s family when they had arrived and begun to follow him. Their renewed presence made Jensen uncomfortable. He had spent too many years being the kingdom’s sorcerer. Fear and awe and respect had always been given him, but attempts on his life were scarce. There was never any thought given to his ability to defend himself, and there was little reason to think him the subject of an assassination attempt.

But Prince Jensen was a desirable target, and the loss of solitude bothered Jensen more than he could say. The only person that he had let inside his walls in years had been Jared. It felt wrong to allow others in his place. That feeling was utter foolishness. Jensen knew this to his core, but that knowing did not make the continued presence of his guards any more tolerable.

By the time that he reached Jared’s home village, he was ready to run fast and far just to escape the devotion of his soldiers. He wanted nothing more than to hide his grief and guilt away. Solitude had been his friend for far too many years, and he craved its companionship.

But he stayed with the casket. He could not, would not abandon Jared.

The family cried and wailed. Jensen did not try to stop them or offer condolences. No suggestion of monetary reward or posthumous knighthood could give them back their son, and Jensen would not sully his own love by offering such. They had never wanted for Jared to be anything but happy, and Jensen doubted that any man who met his grave at such an early age felt that.

They cried and wailed for there was nothing left for them to do other than that. The grave had already been dug; the ministers had already been called. It pained Jensen that they could not see their son and brother one last time. The body had been inside its final home for far too long already. The trip back to Jared’s home village was not a short one and the body would have already started to stink. It was just another piece of life that Jensen and his foolishness had robbed from them.

Eventually, dusk turned into night. The family gave up their vigil around the cart to go back to beds where they would not sleep, but Jensen did not join them. He made his bed on the wooden slats of the wagon besides Jared’s casket.

When the sun rose, Jensen wiped the cold dew from the wood. He ripped the sleeves from his own top coat and polished the wood until it gleamed in the early morning light. There wasn’t a smudge to be seen. It was a pristine coffin that was swallowed into the earth as final blessings were whispered over the husk that it contained.

Jensen quit the town before the clock struck noon. The sun beat down cruelly upon him and his guard as they made their way back towards the capitol. If not for the fact that his horse was the same one that his father had given Jared to ride, Jensen may have given into the temptation to drive both himself and his steed to their deaths. It was a tragic, senseless thought. One that Jensen knew he would never have gone through with, but the hurt inside of him appreciated the concept. It soothed some dark place inside of him.

When he reached the palace, Jensen avoided the main stairwell. He crept along the hidden passage ways and moldering stone steps within them just to avoid the memories of Jared’s healthy, living face as he worked on those wooden steps. It took him twice as long to reach his destination, but finally he stumbled into the area that held the royal chambers. Jensen did not head to his room.

Instead he staggered to his mother’s seating room. For the first time in years, he could see her face. It should have been a happy moment or perhaps even a shocking one, but Jensen couldn’t even make out any of her features.

“Jensen,” her voice was soft and knowing, gentle and caring.

He needed no other invitation and cared not what the guards might think.

Jensen threw himself into his mother’s arms and wept.


End file.
